Fall 2007 fashion shows hit the spectators with a big splash of color — well a big dose of black to be precise. Most of my closet is black, I do after all have a degree in classical music performance. Many nights of my week used to be on stage in all black and even after all those years, I still have a knack for sifting through a rack and pulling off only black. Despite my closet’s penchant for dressing me like a goth girl, I wasn’t prepared for the plethora of black for Fall 2007. The mutton-chop-sleeved monstrosity pictured above is a don’t, as is the cabled hugeness pictured below:

So much for my dream of finding some inspiration for a hand knit sweater for next fall from the fashion shows. Neither Pringle’s cabled yoke nor Cavalli’s crossed wrap with poofed out half sleeves do it for me either.

There is one piece from the fashion shows that I keep coming back to again and again: Zac Posen’s black ruffled jacket. If only someone had done one up in knitwear, oh wait, Cavalli did show something similar but in a sort of frumpy, shapeless, lace weight mohair.

I guess the bottom line is, I should go inspire myself because frankly there isn’t all that much to work with as far as Fall 2007 trends and knitwear trends in particular. I’m sure I can dream up something black, minus the mutton.

i finished the second TechGuy sock today. w00t! my s.o. has quite long feet, so it was no easy feat (har har). if i make him socks again, they will be with a thicker weight yarn to obtain a less stitch-intensive gauge. if you are yearning to knit your first pair of socks, and you’ve never knit in the round, i would recommend grabbing a book or two from your local library before attempting this. i managed to figure it out, but i did undo the first heel three times. now i’m inspired: the next pair will be for myself. i’m thinking i will try toe-up construction to obtain the longest sock possible out of the yarn on hand and may include some fancier stitches to keep myself from getting bored.

We be wrappin’
Don’t ya like it when the girls
shape somefin’?
Knitta don’t pull nothin’ (That’s right)
We ain’t froggin’
We just perlin’ an’ knittin’
like it ain’t nothing wrong
Get ya sock on (we be turnin’)
Ah, we be wrappin’ (we be knittin’)
Yeah ya (we be wrappin’ we be knittin’)

[rare extra chorus to Ice Cube’s We Be Clubbin’]

I turned my first sock heel! I did rip it out three times before making it relatively free of holes in the heel. These are knit top down in what I figured out is a fingering weight german sock yarn by Regia (much smaller than what is detailed for the Tech Guy Socks pattern I semi-followed). I ended up following the wrapping technique detailed in Vogue Knitting on page 186 and not the PGR yarnover method. I don’t own that book by PGR, nor have I ever knit socks, and I must say that without the incredible tutorial on misocrafty, I wouldn’t have had the faintest idea how to turn the heel. I recommend arming yourself with both the Vogue book and the misocrafty tutorial before commencing. If I do attempt the PGR method, I will use this other tutorial with photos for turning a heel. As I mentioned, the weight of the yarn is very very fine and I would recommend using sport weight sock yarn for the Tech Guy Socks pattern, not fingering as I did. I cast on 60 stitches on metric size 3.0 mm (U.S. size 2) double pointed aluminum needles, but the sock barely fits my S.O., 64 stitches would have been better with this extremely fine yarn.

In celebration of my successful wrappin’ and heel turnin’, I joined a KAL (for those of you geeks reading my blog, KAL == KnitALong) where each member knits one pair of socks a month for six months and blogs about it. The KAL, SAM3 (SAM == Sock A Month), is located here. I even grabbed some superwash hand-dyed sock yarn from fearless fibers for the next three pairs. Oh, and I bet you didn’t know Ice Cube was into fiber arts.